But the market has a glut of natural gas due to widespread use of the drilling method, pushing prices to their lowest in a decade and deflating the shale gas rush, leading largeproducers to cut production to try to bring the price up.

In Europe, shale gas exploration would be covered by existing regulations on water contamination and use of chemicals, so there is no need for new regulations at this point, a European Commission report said.

In Obama’s State of the Union address last week Obama mentioned battery makers as an example of clean-tech. The next day Ener1—whose subsidiary, EnerDel, makes electric vehicle batteries and received $118 million in green stimulus grant money—filed for bankruptcy.

Some called this a repeat of Solyndra, the solar panel manufacturer that went bankrupt, and which Obama had touted as a model cleantech business.

However, many others shot back, pointing out that Ener1 is different in many ways. Ener1 will continue operating during bankruptcy proceedings, rather than shutting down as Solyndra did. Also, Ener1 received widespread support over the past several years, netting a deal with the United States Advanced Battery Consortium and a U.S. Department of Defense research grant, and enjoyed bipartisan support.

Overall, it has been a tough time for electric-car battery makers, with demand for electric vehicles lower than expected. But the future is bright for the sector, argued Bloomberg New Energy Finance, with goals to get a million electric cars on the road within the next several years in both China and the U.S.

Also, the California Air Resources Board mandated that by 2025, roughly one in seven cars sold in the state would have to be plug-in hybrid, electric, or fuel-cell vehicles—a standard that 10 other states may likewise adopt.

British supermarket chain Tesco pledged in 2007 to label all its products with their carbon footprint, but the company announced it has given up the plan since it proved too difficult, requiring several months of work for each product, and because other companies didn’t follow their lead.